McConnell and top Trump administration officials plan to spend the next few days cajoling senators and home-state governors in an effort to nail down support for the bill.

However, the bill faces an uncertain passage in the 100-member Senate, where Republicans have a very narrow majority - 52 to 48.

The other Republican senator from Arizona praised McCain.

But Collins said: "I would respectfully disagree with the vice president's analysis". Susan Collins, R-Maine. She has made clear she would vote against the bill, citing proposed cuts to the Medicaid health program for the poor and elderly. Arkansans have been among at least two past groups of demonstrators arrested for taking protests to the Senate office building.

That left Mr. McConnell without a vote to spare.

The provision would let insurers sell low-priced policies with skimpy coverage, as long as they also sell policies that meet a stringent list of services they're required to provide under Obama's law, like mental health counseling and prescription drugs.

That's what GOP senators say they are offering with a revised version of their health care system overhaul. John McCain's announced absence following surgery leaves Republicans short of votes on their marquee legislation. Mr. McConnell has had a more hard time rounding up support in the Senate. A vote was postponed last month also due to limited support.

In a statement released late Saturday, McConnell said the Senate's Better Care Act will not reach the Senate floor while McCain recovers.

They're afraid to vote to take away the "free" or subsidized health care coverage ObamaCare gave millions of voters as it wrecked the already government- wrecked health care world. "I look forward to seeing him back at work soon".

The Senate bill, like legislation the House passed earlier, repeals mandates requiring individuals to carry insurance and businesses to offer it, and unravels an expansion of the Medicaid program enacted under President Barack Obama's law.

The newest version attempts to attract conservative support by allowing insurers to offer skimpy coverage plans alongside more robust ones, but also reaches out to moderates by adding billions in help for the opioid crisis and to defray high costs for consumers. His office said the clot was discovered during an annual physical and removed Friday at the Mayo Clinic Hospital in Phoenix. But with the bill drafted by McConnell, the senior senator from his home state, he said, "we're going to keep most of the taxes, keep the regs, keep the subsidies and create a giant bailout superfund for the insurance companies".

McCain, 80, is a three-time survivor of melanoma.

Sen. John Cornyn tells NBC's "Meet the Press" that there should be a vote once there is a "full contingent of senators" available.